Trump is planning an important step to urge Congress to vote on the trade agreement with North America – despite Pelosis warning

President Donald Trump and Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi of California (Evan Vucci / AP)

Erica Werner

Convention reporter with economic policy focus

30. May at 16:19

The White House plans to launch a lawsuit on Thursday to enable President Trump to submit his new trade agreement with Canada and Mexico to Congress after 30 days. ), who had warned against such a step.

The decision to send the draft "Statement of Administrative Measures" to Congress would mark a milestone in President Trump's efforts to revise the 1994 North American Free Trade Agreement, but heightened tensions with Democrats English: emagazine.credit-suisse German: www.socialistgroup.eu/gpes/sessiond…05&place=STR Pelosi warned US Trade Representative Robert E. Lighthizer to hand over the draft report until the Democrats had spent more time working on the EU White House , And on Thursday, she attacked the White House's decision to move on.

"This points to a lack of knowledge on the part of the administration about the policy and the process for the adoption of a trade agreement," she said in a statement. By handing in the report to the Congress, the White House signaled to the Democrats that It is not envisaged that the legislature will delay the process and soon press for a vote.

A number of White House officials have called on their Western counterparts to follow Pelose's advice and slow the process down in a way that strengthens support among Democrats, a senior government official said. However, other White House officials said Pelosi must be pressured or she would continue the process, and Trump wants a revised NAFTA agreement to be one of the top achievements of his first term.

"You have to send the language up and put it under pressure," said the senior administrative official, who spoke about the internal considerations on condition of anonymity. "That's absolutely ridiculous."

Submitting the draft to Congress is a necessary step before the legislature can formally vote on the agreement. The White House can not send the formal agreement to Congress until 30 days after the draft has been sent to Congress. Nevertheless, the government could wait more than 30 days to produce the final text of the trade agreement.

Pelosi and other Democrats have stated that they want assurance that the new trade agreement will contain, among other things, enforceable rules on environmental and labor policies.

"We all agree that we must replace NAFTA, but without real enforcement mechanisms, we would include American workers in another bad deal," Pelosi said Thursday. "A new trade agreement without enforcement is not progress for the American worker, just a press release for the president."

In a letter to Pelosi on Thursday, Lighthizer tried to make it clear that he was still planning to work with the legislator on issues and that the draft report did not prevent him from addressing their concerns.

Submitting the draft "does not limit our ability to find solutions to address concerns that members have expressed regarding the enforcement of the labor and environmental provisions of the agreement and drug prices," Lighthizer wrote.

The New Trade Agreement The United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement aims to promote more automotive and manufacturing operations in North America by making it harder to avoid import penalties for products manufactured in China and elsewhere, and would require higher wages for many workers opening up Canadian dairy markets to US farmers and strengthening intellectual property protection would also benefit a number of other industries, including pharmaceutical companies.

Trump has seen much of the agreement last year in tense negotiations with Canada and Mexico However, the changes can ers t be finalized when Parliament and the Senate vote on the approval of the agreement to do something that White House officials have announced this year.

Vice President Pence was in Canada on Thursday to speak with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau about the state of the deal's conclusion.